


Towards Something

by Cassidy_OMalley



Category: The Maze Runner (2014), The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Comfort, Complete, Friendship, Gen, One Shot, Post-The Death Cure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-12
Updated: 2015-02-12
Packaged: 2018-03-12 00:15:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3337478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cassidy_OMalley/pseuds/Cassidy_OMalley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thomas doesn't need a reason to run, he needs a reason to stop. He needs closure. He needs to see 3 lost friends one last time.<br/>One-shot: what would Thomas say to the 3 people he had loved and lost during the Trials if he had the chance? And what would they say back to him?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Towards Something

The nightmares came every night.  
It was only natural after everything he’d been through but it was still hard for her to watch. The days were full of activity, all the Immunes working together to create some kind of home in the place presented to them. The work kept his mind busy, distracted against whatever came at night. In the daylight hours he would move between different groups with determined and easy movements. He wasn’t always sure he knew what he was doing but his curiosity and intelligence outweighed any lack of confidence people might have had in him. It was during the day that he was surrounded by people who needed and respected him. It was at these times she saw him relax, even laugh. Sure, there were problems still but they are all problems he can solve—things he can do, people he can help, lives he can save. 

But that was only during the day. At night, everything was different. He was different. His skin grew cold, his breathing fast and shallow, muscles tight, face contorted. There was none of that curiosity or quite strength to be seen. There is only pain and grief. But the worst part was when he couldn’t take it anymore. Every night there was a point when it just become too much for him. He would wake up as silently as he has suffered and do the only thing he knows to do—he runs. Sometimes he’s only gone minutes, but sometimes it’s hours. She doesn’t know where he runs to, if he’s running from or towards something, or if he even knows once he’s gotten there. All she knows is that finally, when he has pushed his mind and body to the point of exhaustion, he returns to face the darkness again for as long as he can. 

Housing isn’t completed yet so most of the Gladers and Group B have taken to sharing a common sleeping area in a canopied section of the trees. That is the only reason she knows what happens every night. It’s not like he ever talks about it. Others must know too but there’s no point in mentioning it. They all have their own demons to face and can’t be bothered with his too. And even if anyone did ask, she’s doubts they’d get a real answer anyway. 

So she does the only thing she can, she waits. She can’t tell if the images change or if it’s just the same thing on replay. All she can tell is it’s bad. She keeps waiting until one night the images must hit a crescendo because he lets out a yell when he jolts into a sitting position. This earns him many swears and demands he keep it to himself but he hears none of it. He simply does what he does every night and throws himself to his feet and shoots off. He runs out of their pack and straight into the trees, going so fast he is out of sight in seconds. She sees another of the bodies rise to sit on his haunches but he doesn’t give chase. He simply watches the trail the first boy has taken. This doesn’t surprise her. This second body is many things, including the occasional jackass, and he will always leave the job of therapist to someone better qualified. Besides, she admits more graciously, they both know the boy. They know what he needs. And right now, it’s not them. He needs something else. 

***

Thomas does the only thing he can. He runs. It’s the only thing he has ever known to do for sure. When things are bad, when things don’t make sense, when things hurt—you run. It doesn’t matter where or how far but as long as his feet move, crushing branch, grass, and who knew what else underneath, his mind can be blank. He doesn’t have to see the visions that come every night. The faces, the screams, the blood, the words, the eyes. He runs because he can’t take it anymore. Because there is no work to distract him. 

…You’re as smart as you look, Tommy. That’s one of the reasons we run this place all nice and busylike. You get lazy, you get sad. Start givin’ up. Plain and simple…

The memory comes unbidden and Thomas runs harder. He can’t take that voice, thick with accent and a natural compassion. He can’t take it because he can’t think about that voice without thinking about the last time he heard it. About how it had changed. The pain, the fear, the desperation, the illness in it. It hurts too much, like a strike to his chest. 

…Thomas. Find my mom. Tell her…

Thomas lets out a cry this time because he can still feel the blood on his hands. He can still feel the remaining bits of innocence drain out of him. He was too young. Everyone was too young for what had happened to them. The possibility of a normal life crushed to dust by a heavy weight. 

…Tom!... 

It was never going to stop. There was too much pain, too much death. And the worst part was, he always seemed to be in the middle of it. One had been taken away in his place. Another had trusted him enough to choose him as executioner. The third had sacrificed herself for him. How was he ever going to make up for all the bad things he had caused? He was crucial in saving over 200 innocent people. He was helping those same people to survive, even have a life. But it wasn’t enough. The nightmares came every night to taunt him. To prove to him that he was no selfless hero. Telling him that he did what he did in no small part to make up for the damage he had done. And to remind him that it would never be enough.  
So he just kept running. 

***

Thomas didn’t know how long or how far he’d run. He just knew that his legs suddenly turned to mush and his chest exploded like an atomic bomb, sending him face first into the dirt. For ten full minutes he just laid there, his body collapsing from the physical strain and refusing to do anything but heave in gulps of air. Once the screaming of his muscles dulled to a cursing groan, Thomas was able to crawl over to a large tree trunk and drag himself up into a sort of seated position. The bit of sky he could see through the trees was still dark and the locusts still called so he knew he still had a few hours before he had to worry about retracing his steps. It’s not a question of if he’s going back or not, because he is. Because he has to. Because that is what guilty selfish people do—they always go back. 

“Oh, don’t be such a drama-queen piece of klunk.” 

After everything that had happened, Thomas would have thought that hearing voices in his head would no longer surprise him. He was wrong. 

“You’re a lot of things, man, but you’re not—OK, maybe a little selfish. But you are also my friend. And I don’t care what that slinthead lady said. I wanted to save you.” 

Thomas can’t help himself, he thrashes his pounding head in every direction to find the owner of the voice. He knows the boy is dead but the voice sounds so real. 

“Who doesn’t want to be the hero? And I got to save the only shank who was stupid enough to run out into the Maze at night. That’s got to count for something.” 

It must have been the fatigue playing tricks on him but Thomas could swear that the moonlight changed and bounced into a pattern in a spot five feet in front of him. It was more of a mirror-image silhouette than anything else but Thomas’s mind filled in the blanks. Early teens, chubby face, oddly cheerful glint in the eye. 

“Chuck.” His voice is something between a strangled gasp and a sigh as a wave of sadness and loss crashes into him. 

“Nice to know the great Thomas hasn’t forgotten me already.” The irritating yet somehow enduring quality is still in the voice, Thomas can feel it. It makes him think about how many times he has imaged this exact moment. In fact, over the months he’s imagined it so many times that there is not just one but multiple versions of it running around his head, all with different ways he would react to seeing Chuck one last time. He’s thought about smacking the kid for doing what he did. He’s thought about telling him how sad he is that he never found his mom. He’s even thought about just hugging him. But now that the moment has come, Thomas realizes that, truly, there is only one thing he needs to do. 

“Thank you.” It’s not just diving in front of Gally’s knife. It’s everything. Chuck gave Thomas friendship, acceptance, and a reason to fight. Thomas can never repay that. 

“You’re welcome, shuck-face.” Chuck is smiling. It’s that annoying smile that Thomas knows he will miss till his dying day.

“Hey, no tears. You promised, Tommy.” Thomas is not proud of the sound he makes when he hears the second voice. It’s more wounded animal than human but he can’t help himself. The space of air and moonlight next to Chuck has shifted to rearrange itself into a second shimmering silhouette. This one taller and leaner than the first. As Thomas blinks back a wetness in his eyes he hadn’t even noticed until that moment, he wonders, how does that voice always seem to know what he is about to do even before he himself does? 

“Newt.” The waves bring not only loss but guilt this time.

The Maze. The Trials. Being taken away from a family that loved him. Who knew what would have happened if he and the rest of WICKED had just left Newt alone? Would the sadness he had battled on a daily basis still have been there? And even if it had (a robotic voice at the back of Thomas’s mind whispered words like “chemical imbalance” and “serotonin” and “depression”) wouldn’t a loving family to help him through it have made all the difference? Maybe then he wouldn’t have tried to kill himself. Maybe then he would never have asked Thomas to…

“I’m sorry.” It wasn’t the bullet or the illness that Thomas was talking about. It was everything else. Newt was the bravest and most selfless person Thomas had ever met. But still Thomas had only ever seen fit to take more things away from him. Even in the end, Newt had had to beg Thomas for the one thing he had ever asked of him. 

“I know you are, you bloody shank.” The compassion was back in the tone. “And it’s ok. But just don’t…don’t think about it anymore. Yeah?” 

It was all there in what the boy wasn’t saying. Forgiveness. Friendship. It was more than Thomas deserved but just what he would have expected coming from Newt. He couldn’t help the smile that pulled at the corners of his mouth. 

“Good that.” The silhouette replied with a nod. Somewhere a quote tickled the back of Thomas’s mind about friendship and brothers being born in times of adversity. 

“I didn’t think you were paying attention in those classes, Tom.” 

Thomas actually laughed this time. It was equal parts relief and regret but a laugh all the same. The third silhouette appeared next to the first two. In comparison, it was feminine and petite with a body language Thomas would know blindfolded. “Teresa.” 

“I’m glad to be able to see you one more time. I think we both needed it.” She was right, of course. Even though many of her choices had wounded him, confused him, and even forced her to leave him, Thomas knew why she had made them. She had been trying to keep him alive. It didn’t matter to her what she had had to do to accomplish that, she would do it. That spoke of a caring and protective nature but there had always been a flaw in her plans. Somewhere along the way she had lost sight of the difference between being alive and living. And, more than once, that loss had almost forced Thomas to pay the cost of his survival with his ability to live. Teresa herself would probably never see the distinction and Thomas accepted that. 

“I understand.” Teresa didn’t want gratitude or forgiveness. All she had ever wanted was for Thomas to understand why she did what she did. And that Thomas was willing to give her. 

“Maybe not completely, but enough.” The feminine voice was soft with affection. “Thanks for finally listening, Tom.” 

There was nothing left to say so Thomas just sat there and smiled. He didn’t know how this moment was possible but for once he didn’t need answers. He just wanted to enjoy the darkness for the first time in months. He mused if maybe this was why he had felt the need to run every night. Maybe he hadn’t been running away from anything, like he’d originally assumed. Maybe he had been running towards this moment all along. 

***

It was dawn before anyone saw Thomas hobbling back into the common sleeping area. No one said anything about it. And if Brenda or Minho noticed that Thomas no longer needed to run every night, no one mentioned that either.

**Author's Note:**

> Went through a lot of different versions before this came out. Please critique and comment!


End file.
